Buyer Allowed to Lower Counter Offer?

[NetRico]

Recent negotiations for one of my domains listed on Sedo were nearing the point where I was considering pushing the name to auction. However, the last Buyer offer came in at $60 ... $640 LESS than his previous offer 3 days earlier. It has always been my understanding that the negotiation process required sellers to lower their price when making a counter offer and buyers to raise their offer if continuing in the negotiations. Is this not the case?

Here are the last few lines from that domain name's bid thread:

12/08/09 ... Buyer's Offer: 375
12/08/09 ... Your Counter Offer: 2,280
12/09/09 ... Buyer's Offer: 700
12/11/09 ... Your Counter Offer: 2,200
12/12/09 ... Buyer's Offer: 60


I've inquired of Sedo support on this matter but, as usual, have not yet received a reply. Based on previous history with Sedo support over the past few years, I'm not expecting a response in 2009.

 

[Theo]

Yes, of course. Each round of offer/counter-offer allows for a raise/lowering of the price by either party. At this point, it's where you cancel the transaction; I wish there was a way to both cancel AND tell the jerk to GFT

 

[INFORG]

Buyer increased his offer 87%
You decrease your offer by 3.5%
Buyer gets pissed off - no surprise.

Negotiating 101 - If you are at your floor in the deal, don't make silly reductions in response to a genuine offer raised. You are better off trying to convince the other party that your offer "really is the best you can do" and leave it where it is. You should have reduced your price to at least <2k to be a real counter offer.

As mostly a buyer, I am frequently frustrated or amused at domainers' lack of skill in making deals and the buyer bashing posts that result. For every lowball buyer, I can find you 6 pie-in-the-sky domainers wanting 5 or 6 figures for XX-XXX names.

 

[Theo]

The way I see it is that buyer made a lowball offer and a secondary "safe bet" offer knowing the seller would never sell at this point. The jerky final offer of $60 is an indication of frustration by the anonymous coward buyer. A buyer with good intentions actually emails the seller to discuss options outside of Sedo. A time-waster jerks around just in this case. A seller that is worth their salt *must* stick to their asking range price or else they should not ask for the opening price to begin with.

 

[theinvestor]

If the seller was willing to send it to auction for $700 ...makes me think he was OK with $700 and just wanted to extract every penny he could. I guess it backfired

 

[DN BROKER]

make a $1000 counter offer and sell.

 

[NetRico]

Buyer increased his offer 87%
You decrease your offer by 3.5%
Buyer gets pissed off - no surprise.

Negotiating 101 - If you are at your floor in the deal, don't make silly reductions in response to a genuine offer raised. You are better off trying to convince the other party that your offer "really is the best you can do" and leave it where it is. You should have reduced your price to at least <2k to be a real counter offer.

As mostly a buyer, I am frequently frustrated or amused at domainers' lack of skill in making deals and the buyer bashing posts that result. For every lowball buyer, I can find you 6 pie-in-the-sky domainers wanting 5 or 6 figures for XX-XXX names.

I certainly don't believe I bashed the buyer in my post ... perhaps you weren't insinuating that.

Reading Comprehension 101 - A careful reading and understanding of the original post will reveal that this is a question concerning Sedo procedure and policy; not a complaint against the buyer. In any event, given that you know neither the domain name in question nor the "conversations" that took place between buyer and seller in these negotiations, I'd suggest that the lessons offered on the art of negotiating are somewhat misplaced in this instance.

 

[INFORG]

The way I see it is that buyer made a lowball offer and a secondary "safe bet" offer knowing the seller would never sell at this point. The jerky final offer of $60 is an indication of frustration by the anonymous coward buyer. A buyer with good intentions actually emails the seller to discuss options outside of Sedo. A time-waster jerks around just in this case. A seller that is worth their salt *must* stick to their asking range price or else they should not ask for the opening price to begin with.

So, buyers should not remain anonymous at Sedo? Why, so the domainer can do more research and base his valuation on how deep the buyer's pockets are instead of the value of the domain? I always try to do the deal outside of Sedo when possible, but do you realize how many of these guys have private whois info?

I agree that a good seller should know what his prices need to be and what the domain is worth, but that just isn't the reality of most Sedo sellers, or how the offer/counter-offer process really works there.

The OP admits he was considering pushing the domain to auction near the last offer price. A counter offer of 2K with the note of "I'll push this one to auction with a $1200 offer" might have resulted in a sale? IMHO, this buyer was willing to negotiate and felt insulted by the counter. A little juvenile - yes, but you are dealing with a wide range of people at Sedo.

 

[NetRico]

FWIW, after some digging through the mess of a website that is now Sedo.com, I've answered my question. The 7-day period in which buyers' offers are considered binding and no lower offer can be issued is "reset" with each seller counter offer.

 

[INFORG]

I certainly don't believe I bashed the buyer in my post ... perhaps you weren't insinuating that.

Reading Comprehension 101 - A careful reading and understanding of the original post will reveal that this is a question concerning Sedo procedure and policy; not a complaint against the buyer. In any event, given that you know neither the domain name in question nor the "conversations" that took place between buyer and seller in these negotiations, I'd suggest that the lessons offered on the art of negotiating are somewhat misplaced in this instance.

NetRico - I really wasn't trying to paint you with that. Was more directed to Acro's comment about calling buyers jerks and to GFT. There are a lot of similar posts on this forum with domainers complaining about buyers. I guess it is to be expected on a domaining forum though

 

[fatter]

with sedos new home page there is a good chance it would have sold for the 700 price if you pushed it to auction not enough eyes with this layout in my opinion

 

[Theo]

NetRico - I really wasn't trying to paint you with that. Was more directed to Acro's comment about calling buyers jerks and to GFT. There are a lot of similar posts on this forum with domainers complaining about buyers. I guess it is to be expected on a domaining forum though

Are you having again a hard time reading entire posts? I didn't call buyers jerks and to GFT. I said that JERK buyers that behave as above deserve to GFT.

I detest bullshit. Negotiation is fine. Time wasting isn't.

So, buyers should not remain anonymous at Sedo? Why, so the domainer can do more research and base his valuation on how deep the buyer's pockets are instead of the value of the domain? I always try to do the deal outside of Sedo when possible, but do you realize how many of these guys have private whois info?

Of course. Do you think I buy and sell domains for some charity or as a hobby? You're damn right I will research my buyer using all the resources available to me. When an anonymous offer plays games using Sedo's platform, I make it clear via my counter-offers about who gives a shit over lowballers.

 

[INFORG]

If you are researching your buyer to determine a value then you don't know the value of the domain. Saying an offer (in most cases) is lowballing is hypocritical since you admit the price is subjective based on the buyer.

You want to be able to tell people to piss off using the Sedo platform because they don't conform to whatever your version of proper offering is. That is clearly anti-buyer bias.

You claimed that in this example the buyer was lowballing. If the OP was considering a push to auction, it obviously wasn't that low. Offering an intitial 375 and the seller has 2200 in mind is not a lowball offer - it's a starting point for negotiation.

If you have a name that you think is worth 2K and they come in with an offer of 2K, you are still gonna try and find out if they can/will spend more and make a counter offer higher. Don't act all insulted when the buyer just offers enough to show that he wants to open it up without tipping his hand on his target price.

An opening offer of 375 on a 1-2K name is perfectly reasonable.

By the way - I wasn't the other party

 

[Theo]

I didn't know there is a Kelly Blue Book for domains Please point me to it and I will show you Baron Munchausen's stories.

Buyer anti-bias? Why stop there with the bs, just call me racist *rolleyes*

The OP posted a full exchange, whereupon his asking price was never reached closely, and on top of that the "buyer" thought it'd be fun to further lowball all the way to the $60 figure.

I shall repeat: a seller that can't research their buyer and won't stay firm in their range of an asking price, is involved in domaining as a hobbyist.

 

[INFORG]

I'm fine with a seller doing whatever they can to maximize the sales price.
I just think many sellers get too sanctimonious when buyers try to minimize the sales price in whatever way they can.

The way I see it is that buyer made a lowball offer and a secondary "safe bet" offer knowing the seller would never sell at this point. The jerky final offer of $60 is an indication of frustration by the anonymous coward buyer. A buyer with good intentions actually emails the seller to discuss options outside of Sedo. A time-waster jerks around just in this case.

Sure, you love buyers

 

[Theo]

To consummate a sale, a seller and a buyer need to reach common ground. A sale that goes sour, like the one in this thread, is an indication of an emotional and immature buyer who somehow believes that by "taunting" the buyer they are achieving something. The old story about the fox and the sweet grapes she'd call "sour" because they were out of reach comes to mind.